Emerald Legionnaire — First Black Chantry Nerf?

Mewcat wrote: Djhedgehog said ...

To address Tworazorreign: There is no other effect in the game that gives permanent intercept to a group of minions. Sure a lot of things make permanent intercept or transient intercept, but only for one minion. If you can't tell the difference I'm not sure how better I can explain this to you.

I understand that Unmasking gives +1 intercept to all allies, which is different than +1 intercept to one minon. I’m just not convinced this is problematic. If all allies have +1 intercept, but you can reliably get +2 stealth, none of the allies can block. I don’t think you need to explain things better. To me, lots of allies getting +1 intercept is a feature and a welcome challenge, not a problem or chore to overcome.

Klaital wrote: If you want to Sudden events there is a card for it already, it's called Not To Be.

Which is a really, really bad card. Why? Opportunity cost.

Sudden Reversal makes sense, because master cards get played all the time (and are very powerful). You can pretty much always find a slot in which to play it, and it won't end up clogging your hand.

Not To Be, on the other hand, is only usable when an event is played. How often does that happen in a normal game? Rarely, and in many games never. And of course, you'll have to have that Not To Be in your hand in order to cancel that event even if it does happen. And you don't want to have it clogging up your hand for the whole game.

Bad card.

If it had some secondary function (cancel a limited set of master cards, for instance) it would be playable. As is, it's wallpaper.

Kushiel wrote:

TryDeflectingThisGrapple wrote: though I strongly suspect that was only created for people who didn't own copies of Unmasking.

Both of them?

TryDeflectingThisGrapple wrote: I think a lot of people are on the bandwagon, so we're seeing it more than we will in a few months when the shininess tarnishes.

Girls deck used to be like this (all over the meta) as well.
It has quieted down considerably and one rarely encounters one nowadays.

Lönkka wrote:

TryDeflectingThisGrapple wrote: I think a lot of people are on the bandwagon, so we're seeing it more than we will in a few months when the shininess tarnishes.

Girls deck used to be like this (all over the meta) as well.
It has quieted down considerably and one rarely encounters one nowadays.

On the other hand: they banned Anthelios pretty much as a direct result of "girls" decks. So it's maybe not the best comparison here, if you're advocating "don't ban or nerf anything"

I'm ressurecting this thread to present some updated stats into the discussion. With the TWDA updated through the beggining of January, we can better see the effect of LK on the meta:

Card - Top 20	Total decks (06/2018 - 01/2019)
On the Qui Vive	59
Pentex(TM) Subversion	57
Vessel	50
Dreams of the Sphinx	48
Giant's Blood	47
Villein	40
Delaying Tactics	36
Telepathic Misdirection	33
Direct Intervention	33
Eyes of Argus	31
Deflection	30
Carlton Van Wyk	29
Wider View	27
Heart of Nizchetus	25
Powerbase: Montreal	24
My Enemy's Enemy	23
Jake Washington	23
Ivory Bow	22
Taste of Vitae	21
Unmasking, The	21

So... where are the Legionnaires?

Still a bit off from the game's staples: ELs have 11 wins in the same timeframe, putting them outside of the top 50 cards. In fact, for comparison, Ashurs and Liquidations both have more wins in the same period (13 and 14, respectively), and have seen increased use for the past couple of years (clearly a result of the Anthology set).

EL does rank the highest among clan-specific cards, but Unleash Hell's Fury is not far behind with 9 wins and Veneficti Mage has 7 - I'd say they're just about balanced once you factor in the 'novelty' effect for ELs.

So, instead of nerfing EL maybe we should be discussing how to bring On the Qui Vive under control.